Just Back. Full Report coming!

[patkingpin]

Just back from our trip!! I posted this in the transportation board, but I am not sure how many check it out so I will post it here too. I will be posting a full trip report in this thread also when I have time. First up is about the drive....
Hey everyone! I am almost rested up from our 2,000+ mile drive that we returned from 2 days ago from Buffalo, NY to Disney! I was told before I left to get the mileage numbers to make the list and well, here they are...
Left Buffalo at 33,082 miles on the car
Arrived in Disney-Coronado Springs at 34,309 on the car which equals a one way journey of 1,227 miles!
left Disney at 34,379 miles on the car.
Arrived in Buffalo at 35,642 miles on the car which equals 1,263 miles on the way home. We did do some driving in Savannah on the way home so that is the difference there.
Grand total was 2,490 miles round trip!

Now onto the details. We took the 90-79-19-77-95-4 route and it was very nice both ways. We stayed in Hampton Inns along the way. Columbia, SC on the way down and then Richmond Hill, GA and Beckley, WV on the way back. The way down the second night we stayed with friends in Orange City, FL.
We left Friday morning 9/30 at 6am and arrived in Disney Sunday morning around 11am. The way home we left Disney around 11am Saturday morning and arrived back in Buffalo Monday night 10/10 around 5pm. We did stop in Savannah Saturday night and went into historic Savannah for a bit and then Sunday morning we returned and did a trolley tour before starting the drive to Beckley.

Traffic - Not bad at all on the way down. We encountered barely any traffic until Friday evening in Charlotte, NC. Rush hour crowds were still trying to get home I believe when we drove through around 6pm. Not bad though, but did slow us down. Construction wasn't an issue that day either. The only other traffic we hit was around Orlando on Sunday morning. Nothing that stopped us, just a lot of traffic. Weather was perfect for the whole drive down also.
On the way home it was a much different story. Terrential downpours caused us to leave a bit earlier than we wanted after our Crystal Palace breakfast. We saw car accidents from the moment we got on I-4 until almost to Jacksonville. Horrible driving conditions in the rain with heavy ponding on the roads. On Sunday we encountered Panthers game traffic around Charlotte but it was mostly going the opposite direction so not much to worry about. We got a late start due to the trolley tour so we had to do the West Virginia hills in the dark. EEEK. Not fun, but totally fun at the same time. Monday (Columbus day) we finished the drive home. This was by far the worst day of driving. Once we hit PA, there was construction every 2 miles it seemed. I was happy to get to NY...or was I? The drive through NY on the 90 was the worst yet. Other Drivers were driving like crazy!! I am used to NY drivers and this was even bad for me. We finally made it home though and loved every minute of it.

Gas prices - These seemed to drop while we were in Disney. We left Buffalo with prices at $3.70. Once we hit PA they started to drop, although every exit I picked to stop on the way down seemed to be $0.10 more expensive than the one I just passed. By the way home, I actually was able to pay $3.08 at one point. By the way, in Buffalo prices are still at $3.65.

That is about it other than to say I loved having my car in Disney! We planned to use buses the whole trip, but only used them once and then ditched them for the car every other day. So much easier with the stroller.
Oh yeah, did I mention it was me, my wife, my daughter who turned 2 during the trip, and my mother in law in an Equinox. Not too shabby, huh?

Let me know if you have any questions I can answer!

 

[patkingpin]

First off, I do plan on adding pictures to this thread as we go, however, they are at home and I am writing this from work, so they will be added after the fact. I will also skip the details of the drive down and start from day 1 at WDW. Also - I will put a link in whenever I get a chance to do so at home, but I did put a full 15 minute video of the Boo to You parade from MNSSHP on Youtube if you want to check it out. Just search for my username there "dispatkingpin", it is the only video there right now...

Day 1 - Arrival. Cast - Me, Wife, Mother in law, Daughter (turned 2 during the trip).

We arrived after the drive and checked in to Coronado Springs. We stayed in the Cabanas 9A. Interestingly, we had called and asked to stay in the Casitas, but didn't get our request. We did however get a second floor Cabana which did fulfill our only other request of not being on the ground level. Let me stop for a second and say this was my first stay in a moderate after staying at Beach Club Villas two times before. This might have been a mistake. While I am not sorry for staying at Coronado, I definitely missed Beach Club and definitely missed the Villa.

After we got settled in the room, we walked the grounds a bit to get familiar with them. We went to El Centro and bought our mugs, had a bite to eat, and then kept walking around to see the Dig Site. We took a peak at that and that was the last we saw of the Dig Site all week. Our room was a water room view. Our view was of the quiet pool right below us. When we swam it was in the quiet pool and it was perfect. My one complaint would not even be a Disney one, but an AT&T one, I only had one bar of service at Coronado the whole week! Do you know how hard it is to post on facebook, twitter, and here with only one bar of 3g?

Once we got accustomed to the grounds, we headed to Downtown Disney. We took the bus to Downtown Disney. Wasn't a bad ride at all, but getting the stroller on and off the bus really wasn't fun, neither was holding the stroller and trying not to hit anyone else. Good thing we had our car with us for the rest of the week!

Downtown Disney was fun. Great way to start the WDW leg of the trip when you have limited time on the first day. We walked starting at the Christmas store and then to west Side and back to the buses. We did stop in the Christmas store for our personalized ornaments (a family tradition). We also discovered the magic of vinylmation for the first time. We had read about them but were now seeing them in person and we are officially hooked.

We decided to use our first counter service meal in DTD. Wolfgang Puck Express has become a big favorite of ours. We love this place for a counter service and what better way to start the trip! I had the Mac N Cheese and shared it with my daughter. Creme Brulee for dessert was amazing. My wife had a turkey (chicken? hmmmm) sandwich which she said was amazing.

After DTD we got on a very busy bus to the Boardwalk. Did I mention the stroller? It is our bigger stroller so it doesn't fold as nicely as an umbrella stroller and gets awkward, but Belle loves it so we brought it. It was at this point I decided to drive as much as possible this week.
I love the Boardwalk. To me it is a very magical place. We took a nice slow stroll down the whole Boardwalk. We caught the fireworks from Illuminations as we were walking, it was amazing. After a quick boat ride to Hollywood Studios with a very interesting conversation, we finally caught another bus and headed back to the room.

We got back to the room and were ready to crash. Day 2 was starting early. A visit to the Magic Kingdom awaits us. My wife wants to be family of the day so we need an extra early start. How will that play out? What kind of a day will we have? Did I mention our 10am appointment at Harmony Barber Shop for Belle on her 2nd birthday? Oh yes, Day 2 is also my daughter's second birthday. Stay tuned!!

 

[patkingpin]

Sorry guys, I have been derailed. More to come though, stay tuned...pics coming soon also!!

 

[jamiesmom07]

Can't wait to read more. Your driving trip sounds like it's pretty close to ours, you have more miles on us though. We are leaving Thanksgiving day and driving down in our Equinox from Erie, PA. By then the road construction should be put to bed for the winter (thank goodness!). Do you have the new model Eq or the older model? Haven't taken the Eq to Florida yet, don't know what to expect on the hills of W.V.
Thanks for writing a tr!

 

[trennr]

 

[patkingpin]

Can't wait to read more. Your driving trip sounds like it's pretty close to ours, you have more miles on us though. We are leaving Thanksgiving day and driving down in our Equinox from Erie, PA. By then the road construction should be put to bed for the winter (thank goodness!). Do you have the new model Eq or the older model? Haven't taken the Eq to Florida yet, don't know what to expect on the hills of W.V.
Thanks for writing a tr!

We have the 2009 Equinox AWD. It performed perfectly in the hills of West Virginia. I never felt like I didn't have control, I just hated the semi's in the dark next to me. Our fault for bad planning there though. When we did the hills in the daylight on the way down, I didn't even hesitate. I kept up with the other traffic for the most part.